Adventures in Grandparenting

Poseidon

My three year old granddaughter likes aquariums and so does my husband. Consequently, I have visited 4 aquariums in the last year, in 3 different states. That is more than I have visited in the two previous decades! It’s not that I don’t enjoy marine life, it just hasn’t been at the top of my ‘to do’ list. I might write about all my aquarium adventures in a future post but now I want to share about my favorite aquarium to date, the Long Island Aquarium in Riverhead, NY.

For my birthday my husband took me on a weekend trip to Long Island. We had never explored this area of New York before, we took the ferry over in order to drive around and take a look. We brought our oldest granddaughter (the one who likes aquariums) with us, she had fun and we were able to spend some quality time with her.

Since it was my birthday (weekend) the aquarium let me in free, a nice saving off the admission price. I had already booked our ferry passage home, at a specific time, therefore we allotted 2 hours for the aquarium visit. This was not nearly enough, a family could easily bring lunch and stay for 3 or 4 hours. We arrived when it opened and since it wasn’t crowded, we could move freely and quickly. It’s not that the aquarium is huge but every bit of it is designed to draw you in. The first thing you do is take a walking bridge across a pond that has skates and various fish swimming in it, ending at a waterfall. They have beautiful murals painted on some walls and the other walls are encrusted with sand and shells, with huge seashell wall sconces. Whoever designed the aquarium focused on detail and it definitely enhances the visitor experience.

My husband really likes rays, he finds them fascinating. They had a ray touch tank (as most aquariums do) but they also let you feed them. Wow! In fact you were able to feed a variety of animals. I remember when I was a child, my grandmother would take me to see the seals at the zoo. She always purchased the seal food, so I could feed them. I loved it and have fond memories of her and I doing that together. I am glad they do that here.

Besides the general aquarium fare, they have a reptile house, a Japanese Snow money exhibit and a building from the lost city of Atlantis with Poseidon sitting on top. This building is designed for the budding archeologist. Kids can dig through ruins, shift dirt looking for artifacts and find ‘gold nuggets’ (aka small rocks) in the gold mine. Awesome idea.

This is a beautiful and interesting aquarium inside and out. If you ever find yourself in Long Island, NY this must be on your list of places to visit.

Here is their website in case you are interested – Longislandaquarium.com